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giovedì 22 maggio 2014

Almost 7,000 complaints of prison overcrowding in Italy

European Court of Human Rights deadline approaches

(ANSA)
- Strasbourg, May 21 - The European Court of Human Rights has
received 6,829 complaints against inhumane conditions caused by
prison overcrowding in Italy, the court told ANSA on Wednesday. The
complaints are similar to those cited in a January 2013 sentence in
which the Strasbourg court ordered Italy to address the "degrading
and inhumane conditions" in its prisons.

The
Strasbourg court gave Italy until May 27, 2014 to correct
overcrowding, which is a contributing factor in the high incidence of
self-injury and suicide among the country's inmates. Justice Minister
Andrea Orlando on March 25 said Italy's prison population still
exceeded legal capacity by around 10,000 inmates. At the time of the
sentence, Italy's jail population stood at just over 65,700 compared
to around 47,500 available places.

The
figure had fallen to around 60,800 in March, and Orlando said he
hoped to see the gap narrow further. In December the government of
ex-premier Enrico Letta passed a controversial decree aimed at
reducing overcrowding by releasing some inmates early. Since then the
succeeding government of Matteo Renzi has softened sentences for
light-drug offenders.